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Wednesday, 14 May 2014

The Imperial crown jewels of Iran

The Imperial crown jewels of Iran include several elaborate crowns and decorative thrones, thirty tiaras, a dozen bejeweled swords and shields, a vast number of unset precious gems, and numerous other objects cast in precious metals and encrusted with gems.

The collection is housed at The Treasury of National Jewels, known colloquially as the Jewellery Museum. It is situated inside the Central Bank of the Islamic Republic of Iran in Tehran. The Imperial crown jewels of Iran are said to be the largest set of displayed jewels in the world in state ownership in one location.

The majority of the items in the collection were acquired by the Safavid dynasty, which ruled Iran from 1502 to 1736 AD. Afghans invaded Iran in 1719 and sacked the capital of Isfahan and took the Iranian crown jewels as plunder.

Nader Shah Afshar successfully drove the Afghans from Iran in 1729. In 1738, the Shah launched his own campaign against the Afghan homeland.

The victorious Nader Shah returned to Iran with what remained of the plundered crown jewels as well as several other precious objects now found in the Iranian Treasury.

These included heavily jewel-encrusted thrones and numerous diamonds, emeralds, rubies, and sapphires. Four of the most prominent acquisitions from this conquest were the Koh-i-Noor and Darya-ye Noor diamonds, the Peacock Throne, and the Samarian Spinel.

When the Iranian revolution toppled the Pahlavi dynasty in 1979, it was feared that in the chaos the Iranian crown jewels had been stolen or sold. Although some smaller items were stolen and smuggled across Iran's borders, the bulk of the collection remained intact.

The revolutionary government under the presidency of Hashemi Rafsanjani re-opened the permanent exhibition of the Iranian crown jewels to the public in the 1990s. They remain on public display.